Textile drafting apparatus



Feb. 8,1938. v ELZER 2,107,818

I TEXTILE DRAFTING APPARATUS Filed lay a, 1936 2 sheets-sheet 1illlilllllll lsllllllllllllllllllllll E illlllllllilllllllllllllllllllllir IHIIIIN lillllll-l NIH]*lllllllllllIIIIIIIIIIIIIHI:

mm mun N J E L z 2, E TING APPARATUS Patented Feb. 8, 1938 UNITED STATESPATENT OFFICE- Application May a, me. Serial Ne. 18,115 In Germany May28, 1935 Claims.

This invention relates to apparatus for drafting textile fibres having arelatively long, staple such as wool or artificialsilk and has for itsobject to provide improved apparatus for this pur- The spinning of woolin its original condition on cotton spinning machines of the ordinarytype is not possible since wool in general has a much longer staple thancotton being generally from 60 to '70 mm. long and ordinary cottonspinning machines are designed. to deal with fibres of considerablyshorter length. Furthermore, and this is of essential importance in thepreparation for spinning the drafting of wool (for instance by combing)presents difficulty owing to the strong adhesion of the separate fibres.If the length only of the wool fibres had to be contended with it wouldbe possible, by suitable adjustment of the drafting rolls, to effectthe, necessary drafting, but owing to the adhesion above referred towhole bunches of wool fibres adhering together are found to beunavoidably torn out during the drafting or thinning from the aligningmember (for instance the comb) which obviously causes thickening of theyarn and is of course very undesirable.-

Similar conditions exist in the case of other long-staple fibrousmaterials, such as artificial silk having a fibre length of say 60 to 70mm. or

o more and such materials cannot be spun on the cotton spinning machineshitherto in use.

Drafting apparatus is known in which rolls provided with projectingwires or needles are interposed between the drai'ting rolls for thepurpose 35 of avoiding the difficulties above explained, but

all these special rolls were arranged to be positively driven and didnot effect the desired result since they did notta'ke account of thespecial nature of the fibre fleece. In some cases the needle rolls wereprovided with resilient needles or wires in order to avoid as much aspossible the tearing out of bunches of fibres, which often occurred withrigid needles. But even these resilient needles did not-workreliably'and frequently 45 tore out bunches of fibres.

v The present invention avoids these disadvantages by providing draftingapparatus for spin-.-

ningvmachines in which a needle roll interposed between the pairs ofdrafting rolls are arranged 5 to be capable of free rotation and aredriven only by the fibre fieece or band.

Owing to the fact that the needle rolls employed'aceording to 'thepresent invention are arranged to rotate freely, their rotation being 55merely produced by the movement of the fibre band or sliver, the tearingout of bunches of fibres from the band during drafting is avoided andfurthermore, the freely rotatable needle rolls exert a relative'brakingaction on the wool fibres.

The invention is illustrated by way of example 5 g in the accompanyingdrawings of which:

Figure 1 is a diagrammatic plan view of one form of drafting apparatusembodying the invention, Figure 2 being asimilar view of a modificationalso embodying the invention. 10

Figure 3 is a diagrammatic view in end elevation of the usual rollarrangements in cotton drafting apparatus, Figures 4 and 5 being similarviews corresponding to the forms of apparatus embodying the'invention,shown in Figures 1 l and 2 respectively.

Referring now to Figures 1, 3', and 4 it will be seen that the draftingapparatus for cotton spinning shown in Figure 3 is modified inaceordance with the invention so as to be capable l) of drafting woolfibres in the manner shown in Figures 1 and 4 in that the rolls II ofFigure 3 are replaced by a needle roll NWI. The needle roll NWI is notpositively driven and is so mounted as to engage with the fibre fleeceor band at slightly above the level of contact of the rolls I, III, andIV which remain unaltered.

In operation the silver or band is drawn along by the feed rolls I tothe needle roll NWI and subsequently gripped between the rolls 111. By

- the drafting action between the rolls I and III the sliver or band isstretched, the needles on the needle roll NWI piercing the band and theneedle roll being rotated by the band. In this way a braking action isexerted on the wool fibres whereby bunches of fibres are prevented frombeing torn out during the drafting operation. Furthermore, a looseningand in particular a constrained guiding of the wool fibres is alsoeffected, so that the drafting of the fleece between the rolls III andIV can be effected without difficulty. Since the needle roll is somewhatraised, the wool sliver as will be. seen from Fig. 4 is bent upwardsbetween the rolls I and III in passing over the needle roll NWI insteadof following a continuous straight line path. The operation of theapparatus is the same when treating other long-staple material such asnatural or' artificial silk having relatively long fibres. w

A non-driven needle roll NW2 mayalso be interposed between the rolls IIIand IV as shown in Figures 2 and 5, the roll NW2 being also in aslightly raised position with the needles carried thereby penetratingthe fibre band. Thissecond needle roll NW2 is carried along by thewoolen thread band and performs the same action as the roll NWI- betweenthe rolls I and III. Beyond the needle roll NW2 a pair of upper andlower rolls under free pressure may if desired be provided for guidingthe wool fibres from the second needle roll NW2 to the rolls IV.

Any further drafing apparatus and in some cases other apparatus providedfor .example flyers, throstles and self-actors are arranged in a similarmanner and are provided with needle rolls which are not positivelydriven.

It will be understood that the invention is not limited to theparticular construction and arrangement of apparatus illustrated by wayof example as applied to cotton drafting ap;paratus,'

but may also be applied to machines for drafting worsted or silk orother fibrous materials, and various modifications may be made thereinwithin the scope of the appended claims.

Having now described my invention, what I claim as new and desire tosecure by Letters Patent is:-- 1

1. In textile drafting apparatus the combination of a plurality of setsof drafting rolls through which the sliver to be drafted passes insuccession. and a needle roll interposed between two adjacent sets ofdrafting rolls and rotatably driven by the sliver.

2. In textile drafting apparatus the combination of a plurality of setsof drafting rolls through which the sliver to be drafted passes insuccession and a freely rotatable needle roll interposed between twoadjacent sets of drafting rolls and engaging with and raising saidsliver.

3. In textile drafting apparatus, the combination of at least three setsof drafting rolls through which the sliver to be drafted passes insuccession, and a plurality of needle rolls, each interposed between twoadjacent sets of drafting rolls and rotatably driven by the silver.

4. In textile drafting apparatus, the combination of at least three setsof drafting rolls through which the sliver to be drafted passes insuccession and at least two freely rotatable needle rolls eachinterposed between two adjacent sets of drafting rolls and engaging withand raising said sliver.

5. In textile drafting apparatus, the combination of at least three setsof drafting rolls through which the sliver to be drafted passes insuccession, and a freely rotatable needle roll interposed between thefirst and second set of drafting rolls and engaging with and rotatabiydriven by said sliver.

JOHANN ELZER.

